Feint

[Bevan of Hertfordshire]

Has anyone tried attacking a province with a big army and using a small army to hold off a bigger army in an adjacent province and then calling off the attack.

Just wondering.......... http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/confused.gif

[katar]

use it a lot of the time and couldn`t live without it, always handy when attacking larger nations.

doing it really cuts down on the AI`s options. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif

[Bevan of Hertfordshire]

nice to know theres someone else.. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif

[Balamir]

here's one more. that strategy is very useful although the computer gives you the hesitant vice after a while http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/frown.gif

[kawligia]

Not to offend anybody but I think that is actually just an oversight on the part of the programmers. To me using it would cheapen any victory so much I may as well put in some sort of cheat code or something. There is just no reason to ever hold up thousands of troops for one little group of trash talking hobos. (If only the game would give you the OPTION to recall your troops to defend or continue with movement orders it wouldn't be a problem.)

I made a post a while back but I captured Egypt, left a small garrison and moved on to the very next provence and took it. Then the Egyptians send an army to Egypt forcing me to retreat to the stronghold (My gigantic army now sandwiched between two (weak) Eqyptian armies,one in each provence). I wanted to send one of my 3 stacks to relieve the seige, but the Egyptians kept attacking me with a puny group of a couple hundred losers. So a full stack was forced to stick around and help the other TWO stacks fight off a handful of idiots who retreated anyway. They did this for 3 years in a row forcing me to lose Egypt. There is absolutely NO reason for that whatsoever. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/angry.gif

Thats like abandoning your wife and child in a burning building so you can help a freind kill a nasty looking cockroach. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/pissed.gif

[HopAlongBunny]

I use it sometimes. I had no idea how effective it can be 'til I read a post here; the AI will use it against you, why not return the favour http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif

[Bevan of Hertfordshire]

Quote[/b] (kawligia @ Sep. 17 2003,00:31)]Not to offend anybody but I think that is actually just an oversight on the part of the programmers. To me using it would cheapen any victory so much I may as well put in some sort of cheat code or something. There is just no reason to ever hold up thousands of troops for one little group of trash talking hobos. (If only the game would give you the OPTION to recall your troops to defend or continue with movement orders it wouldn't be a problem.)

I made a post a while back but I captured Egypt, left a small garrison and moved on to the very next provence and took it. Then the Egyptians send an army to Egypt forcing me to retreat to the stronghold (My gigantic army now sandwiched between two (weak) Eqyptian armies,one in each provence). I wanted to send one of my 3 stacks to relieve the seige, but the Egyptians kept attacking me with a puny group of a couple hundred losers. So a full stack was forced to stick around and help the other TWO stacks fight off a handful of idiots who retreated anyway. They did this for 3 years in a row forcing me to lose Egypt. There is absolutely NO reason for that whatsoever. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/angry.gif

Thats like abandoning your wife and child in a burning building so you can help a freind kill a nasty looking cockroach. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/pissed.gif
You could have split your army up, one to fend off the egyptians and one to relieve the army in egypt, i've done that a few times.

[katar]

Quote[/b] ]here's one more. that strategy is very useful although the computer gives you the hesitant vice after a while

i know, my advice is to always have a minior unit in charge of the diversionary force, they get the vice and you can discard/kill/use in battle under a greater leader later on.

you don`t even need a one star general for this tactic. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif

[kawligia]

Quote[/b] (Bevan of Hertfordshire @ Sep. 17 2003,08:11)]You could have split your army up, one to fend off the egyptians and one to relieve the army in egypt, i've done that a few times.
Thats what I tried to do...I left 2 stacks in Sinai (stack A and stack B) and sent one (stack C) to Egypt to relieve the seige. Because the ones in Sinai (A and B) were attacked, stack C cancelled the orders to move west and relieve the seige so they can stay in Sinai to help stacks A and B.

So for 3 years in a row they attacked and ran away and my detachment refused to move because of a few stragglers on the horizon.

You should have the option to continue orders or recall troops for defence. #1 I didn't need the extra thousand troops to help the other two thousand fight a couple hundred and #2 If I had to lose one provence I would have rather kept Egypt. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/angry.gif